Bay 12 Games Forum
Finally... => Life Advice => Topic started by: Killas[SiN] on October 03, 2009, 08:39:41 pm
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Hi people,
I've decided this term break I actually need to do my homework because I am under the principal's spotlight...
Well, I'm only 13 but I'm doing my IGCSE and we have started on global literature analysis. I'm not sure if that's the right term, but it's when you compare different poems and prose together.
i.e - 'Lord of the Flies' tells us how our savage instincts are dominant over our civility, for it is conditioned into us from society; Golding uses dark and unsparing diction to create a barbarous, demoniac atmosphere. 'There Will Come Soft Rains' on the other hand conveys to us a message - despite the wondrous technologies we create, our doom is certain for all it takes is our warlike nature end the world in one "titanic" instant.
Yeah, well something like that.
Well, currently my homework is to do a global analysis on the following three short stories - 'The Signalman' by Charles Dickens, 'There Will Come Soft Rains' by Ray Bradbury and 'Meteor' by John Wyndham.
I know that I have to analyse stuff like diction, mood, authorial tone/prescence and syntax, but apart from that, I'm kinda clueless.
Do you guys have any hints, tips and suggestions for me?
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pick up random things from the books, and pretend they have deeper meaning, like you are some sort of snobby art critic.
now write what you just pretended and pass it off as not-bullshit.
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I love doing that. Making up crap (or blowing little themes WAY out of proportion) is a wonderful way to score high in English (the way it works in my country at least), as a major part of things is simply successfully getting your pooint across, no matter how insane that point is. Just write like you actually believe what you're putting down and give lots of examples and quotes.
Take with a pinch of salt - my countries english exam/essay structure is almost definitely a lot different from yours.
(On another note, I'm expected to write 4 essays, and do a paper analysing texts, in 3 hours straight at the end of the year. Learn to say a lot, while writing little, it helps you later.)
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I love doing that. Making up crap (or blowing little themes WAY out of proportion) is a wonderful way to score high in English (the way it works in my country at least), as a major part of things is simply successfully getting your pooint across, no matter how insane that point is. Just write like you actually believe what you're putting down and give lots of examples and quotes.
I'm a lit major.
And guess what.
That STILL works! BAHAHAHAHA
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I love doing that. Making up crap (or blowing little themes WAY out of proportion) is a wonderful way to score high in English (the way it works in my country at least), as a major part of things is simply successfully getting your pooint across, no matter how insane that point is. Just write like you actually believe what you're putting down and give lots of examples and quotes.
I'm a lit major.
And guess what.
That STILL works! BAHAHAHAHA
I did that once in my essay and my teacher ripped it up infront of me.
I failed the whole module 'cause of that -.-
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If you want to write good essays:
1. Read the texts thoroughly, several times. Take notes or highlight/underline if that helps you.
2. Consider the themes you need to analyze.
3. Form solid opinions.
4. Present these opinions as theses of your essays and back them up with evidence from the text, cited either directly or indirectly.
If you want to get good grades:
1. Find out what your teacher's opinions are.
2. Use those opinions as your theses.
Sadly, I had to learn this the hard way in high school. I wrote many essays with controversial - but well-supported - theses and got terrible grades on every one of them because the teacher said my thesis was "incorrect." I learned to just rephrase the day's lesson in my essays, no matter how asinine I thought it was, and then my grades went back up.
Of course, you might be lucky and have a decent teacher who is willing to accept that ideas that he/she does not necessarily agree with can still make good theses as long as they are well-supported. But in my experience, that tends to be the exception rather than the rule.
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Blag it like a demon of blaggery.
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Imagery is the key. Make your thesis something like "The [adjective] imagery in these three works contributes to an overall [adjective] tone." Jump on anything that mentions color, smell, or anything like that.
Then in your body paragraphs: "Words such as [blah] and [blargitty-blargh blargh] add to the [adjective] tone/mood."
Hell, you could use that format Mad-Libs style and get an A as long as you have some kind of analysis.
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If you ever have to read anything by a French author, by the way, you're pretty much safe if you can find out the author's opinions on 1. women/romance 2. death/religion 3. politics/the poor. I don't think I've ever read anything French that didn't cover at least one of those themes in an extremely blatant fashion.
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http://www.cliffsnotes.com/ (http://www.cliffsnotes.com/)
http://www.sparknotes.com/ (http://www.sparknotes.com/)
Fin.
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Thanks for your help guys...
And turns out I got a 19/20!
Which is A+!!!
Woo!!!